His father, Daniel Augustus Beaufort, was a Protestant clergyman from Navan, County Meath, Ireland, and a member of the learned Royal Irish Academy.

[citation needed] By later in life, he had become sufficiently self-educated to associate with some of the greatest scientists and applied mathematicians of his time, including Mary Somerville, John Herschel, George Biddell Airy, and Charles Babbage.

While serving on Phaeton, Beaufort was badly wounded leading a cutting-out operation off Málaga in 1800; the action resulted in the capture of the 14-gun polacca Calpe.

While recovering from his wounds, during which he received a "paltry" pension of £45 per annum, he helped his brother-in-law, Richard Lovell Edgeworth, to construct a semaphore line from Dublin to Galway.

Notably, Alexander Dalrymple remarked in a note to the Admiralty in March 1808, that "we have few officers (indeed I do not know one) in our Service who have half his professional knowledge and ability, and in zeal and perseverance he cannot be excelled.

[8] Throughout 1811–1812, Beaufort charted and explored southern Anatolia, a region he referred to as Karamania, locating many classical ruins, including Hadrian's Gate.

[11]: 196 In 1831, a Scientific Branch of the Admiralty was formed, which as well as the Hydrographic Department included the great astronomical observatories at Greenwich, England, and the Cape of Good Hope, Africa, and the Nautical Almanac and Chronometer Offices, and Beaufort was responsible for the administration.

Beaufort represented the geographers, astronomers, oceanographers, geodesists, and meteorologists to that government agency, the Hydrographic Office, which could support their research.

[13][11]: 198 Beaufort trained Robert FitzRoy, who was put in temporary command of the survey ship HMS Beagle after her previous captain committed suicide.

[11]: 203  Beaufort's enquiries led to an invitation to Charles Darwin, who later drew on his discoveries in formulating the theory of evolution he presented in his book The Origin of Species.

Later, when Beaufort persuaded the Board of Trade to set up a Meterorological Department, Fitzroy became its first director[11]: 192 Using his many connections, including the Royal Society, Beaufort helped to obtain funding for the Antarctic voyage of 1839–1843 by James Clark Ross for extensive measurements of terrestrial magnetism, coordinated with similar measurements in Europe and Asia.

Aiding his friend William Whewell, Beaufort gained the support of the Prime Minister, Duke of Wellington, in expanding record-keeping at 200 British Coastguard stations.

Beaufort gave enthusiastic support to his friend, Sir George Airy, the Astronomer Royal and noted mathematician, in achieving a historic period of measurements by the Greenwich and Good Hope observatories.

He became "Sir Francis Beaufort" on being appointed KCB (Knight Commander of the Bath) on 29 April 1848, a relatively belated honorific considering the eminence of his position from 1829 onward.

During these early years of command, Beaufort developed the first versions of his Wind Force Scale and Weather Notation coding, which he was to use in his journals for the remainder of his life.

From the circle representing a weather station, a staff (rather like the stem of a note in musical notation) extends, with one or more half or whole barbs.